


Dreadful Sorry

by Cacid



Category: Inspector Gadget (Cartoon)
Genre: Certainly sad, F/M, Sappy Letter Writing, the whole cast is involved
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-05
Updated: 2018-09-05
Packaged: 2019-07-07 03:18:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,831
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15899817
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cacid/pseuds/Cacid
Summary: An accidental trip to the future brings to light new aspects of the complicated relationship between Penny and Talon and sets in motion a series of events that will spell the end either of M.A.D. or of the world as we know it. It's time to reconsider some loyalties...





	Dreadful Sorry

**Author's Note:**

> I absolutely do not own "Inspector Gadget" or anything associated with it.  
> I do own all the mistakes and accept all the associated blame.  
> Yes, indeed, I have systematically spelled it "MAD" instead of "M.A.D." and I cannot give a reasonable explanation as to why I have done this. I hope you don't mind.

“This is all your fault!” Talon and Penny screamed at each other as the Professor’s contraption finally spat them out into Metro City’s central park.

            “Well,” Penny glanced in all directions, “I guess it doesn’t matter whose fault it is given that we’ve only gone what, a few kilometers? It’s totally yours by the way.”

            “No way,” Talon brushed himself off as he got to his feet. “Later!”

            Penny sighed. “And just like that, he’s gone.” She really needed rocket boots of her own.

            There were enough subtle differences—trashcans of a different color, larger trees, slightly altered buildings, a new pancake joint—to inform her that this wasn’t the park she thought it was. “Oh, great,” she muttered, placing a call to HQ. The chief picked up immediately, looking slightly older and very confused.

            “Penny? But you can’t be Penny!”

            New white streaks in his hair, his voice slightly wheezier… oh please don’t let this be another time travel debacle. “Uh, why can’t I be Penny?”

            “Because I’m right here,” came a voice slightly deeper and rougher than her own. She balked as a young woman perhaps three years older than her stepped into view. Other Penny looked Penny over with a scrutinizing gaze before nodding to herself. “But he’s wrong. You’re definitely me. Time travel?”

            “I guess? I just got here…”

            The chief sighed and rubbed his nose. “You’d better come in, then. Don’t try to look at any of the new equipment or inspirational posters at HQ. We’ll keep you away from the things you really can’t see.”

            “I’ll meet you- uh, me- at the door,” Other Penny waved. “See you in a minute.”

***

            MAD’s hideout was not there anymore. Well, it was there, but Talon had to smash through a huge pile of debris to even get inside, and the rest of the place looked to be in no better condition than the entranceway. “Hello?” he called shrilly into the dark. Stagnant water pooled on the cracked tile floor, dripping in steadily from the ruined ceiling. A few raw lightbulbs sputtered to life when he turned on the emergency power, but flickered and died with electric screams immediately. “Oh my god what happened? I was only gone for like two hours! Uncle Claw?” Who was he kidding? There wasn’t anyone here, and the place was structurally unsound. He shouldn’t go running through this place pell-mell… he was already doing that.

            Someone had fought a small war in the hideout. Soot, ashes, plaster, and shattered beams lay in heaps at every opportunity. Talon jumped over them as carefully as possible, glancing at the darkened ceiling, praying he didn’t destabilize something.

He eventually made his way to the control room. “Uncle?” This was the place where Claw would be… would have been when whatever happened had happened. What could have happened? The Baron maybe? No. Not a chance. Not his style. Some other supervillain? This didn’t look like HQ’s work, or the work of any other “good guy” for that matter.

            Papers, stained and rotting, lay about the room, the smell of mold nearly overpowering…and how had the whole place sprouted so much mildew in the two hours he’d been gone? Unless he hadn’t been gone just two hours… “Oh, heck, it’s another time travel debacle!” Of course it was. Now that he thought about it, there had been a number of new buildings (and missing old buildings) in Metro City, which he had noted half-heartedly as he left, more concerned with getting home. That didn’t solve the problem of what had happened here though. Maybe Uncle Claw had just moved to a different hideout? He’d have to try to find him and get back to his own time, of course. Maybe, given his knowledge of its future fate, he could prevent this hideout from being sacked. That would show them! There weren’t any other MAD Agents who could pull of something like _that_! Take _that_ Henchman Two!

            Talon most certainly did not jump halfway to the ceiling when his phone rang. Absolutely not. He didn’t recognize the number, but given the situation it seemed wise to pick up. “Talon?” it was obviously Penny.

            “How did you even get this number?” he screeched at her, wincing as some plaster fell from the ceiling, provoked by his voice.

            “I’ve had your number for years, genius,” Penny replied.

            “Wait… are you like, Penny from the future?”

            “Hence me having your number for years,” Future Penny replied dryly. In the background, HQ agents shouted something unintelligible and an explosion followed. Talon presumed Gadget was still an active field agent, then. “Anyway, I know you well enough to guess what you’re thinking about doing and I know enough to tell you it’s a really bad plan. You’re not going to find your uncle, or your future self for that matter, no matter how hard you look. You won’t be looking in the right places—” she paused abruptly, apparently composing herself although Talon couldn’t begin to guess why.  “You need to come to HQ.”

            “And why exactly would I ever be stupid enough to do that?”

            Future Penny sighed. “You have no reason to trust me, but trust that, as an HQ agent, I have every reason to want to send you- and me for that matter- back to the past as quickly as possible, and believe me when I tell you that you’re not going to get home without HQ’s help.”

            “What if I don’t want to get home?” asked Talon, not entirely sure if that were true or not.

            “What? Well, Past Me is going back home with or without you. You want to miss out on years of training? We were about evenly matched when we were the same age. Think about it. I’m three years older than you now and I’ve been working hard in the interim. You really want to lose every fight we ever have as badly as I tell my friends you do?”

            He balked at that last comment, but her reasoning was… sound. Fine, it was sound. He’d have a hard time beating her if she had three years’ experience on him. “How do I know you won’t just arrest me when I get there, send yourself back, and throw me in jail?”

            “I have your private phone number.”

            “Yeah, so?”

            “So, how do you think I got that? You don’t trust me not to lie to you about something like this right now, but you will at some point.”

            “Well…” Was that a good argument or a paradox?

            Future Penny sighed deeply, not quite exasperated. “Just come to HQ, Talon. We’ll ship you guys home, no questions asked, no tricks or traps. We can all get on with our lives. Promise on my honor.”

            Talon hung up and stared at the ruined walls of the hideout. He’d been looking for MAD’s secret signals, trying every trick he knew to get in contact with the group. They were hiding very well…either that or they were all gone, but he didn’t believe that. MAD always came back.

            “Fine, Penny,” he muttered. “I’ll come to HQ. You’d better keep your promise or I’m going to find future me and have him—me—help me kick your butt.”

***

            It was a few hours later that Talon arrived at HQ. Future Penny, taller and stronger, hair pulled back in a braid rather than two pigtails, almost regal power in her stride, met him at the door. Given what she had become in three years, he wondered what he looked like now. Maybe he was wearing his hair longer, too? Would that be a good look for him? Probably not. He almost shuddered at the thought.

            “Come on,” Future Penny gestured. “The Professor and Past Me are in the lab working on reversing the accident that sent you guys here.”

            “Uh… great,” Talon rubbed the back of his head awkwardly, aware of all the eyes and cameras on him. Walking through HQ was different when he was in disguise and unwelcome.

            “Don’t try to take anything,” Future Penny warned him as they walked through the halls and HQ agents stared at him wide-eyed from the alcoves. “I can tell you from experience that taking technology to the past never ends well, no matter what your intention was. It tends to explode… or get corrupted… or ruin your hair. I know that last one would be a tragedy for you!”

            “Hey!” He wasn’t sure whether he should trust that advice or not.

            The pair stepped into the lab. Past Penny, or perhaps just Penny, glowered at Talon. “This is definitely your fault!” She slammed her fist down on the surface of the glossy table and Von Slickstein yelped and implored her to be more careful.

            Future Penny glanced at the two time travelers who were now arguing fervently over “whose fault” it was that they got into “this mess.” The professor peeked at her over the head of the two young ones and shrugged helplessly. “Wow. I’d forgotten all about this,” he said.

            “Idiots!” Future Penny yelled. Both of them started to point to the other, but she cut them off, “Yes. Plural. Past Me and Past Talon. You’re not helping anything whatsoever. Penny already gave us a pretty good description of what happened, so we don’t need anything more from you. I can’t believe I thought it was a good idea to put me and Talon in a room together,” she sighed and rubbed the bridge of her nose, “Go to the cafeteria and get ice cream or something. We’ll come get you when we have this worked out.”

            When Future Penny yelled at them, it was something like being chastised by a hurricane. Penny and Talon fled the room. “That’s what happens to me in the future?” Penny muttered.

            “And I didn’t think you could get any more freakishly weird,” Talon added. Penny slapped him on the shoulder, not hard enough to provoke retaliation, but hard enough to make him yelp.

            “Can you even _feel_ that through your armor, you big baby?”  
            “Again, hey. No, not really… it’s just out of habit you know? Someone hits you, you yell. Otherwise they might think they haven’t hit you hard enough yet and keep doing it…”

            A flock of HQ agents sailed by, whispering quietly and staring at the two of them as if they’d seen ghosts. “Well, that went dark places fast.”

            “Yeah. Just, forget I said that okay?”

            “Not on your life.”

            “Oh come on!”

            The two of them wandered into the cafeteria. Brain, sitting at a booth halfway across the brightly lit room, and looking a bit worse for the years, yelped as he caught sight of the two of them. Talon yelped as he caught sight of Mad Cat. “What’s she doing here?” He looked ready to bolt for the nearest window, and Penny seconded the motion. Unless this was some elaborate MAD plot, why would Mad Cat would be at HQ…?

            “Hey!” Kayla, waved to them, rushing up to meet the time travelers. Someone had clearly alerted her to meet them. “Don’t worry, Mad Cat’s often here. She’s on probation so Brain keeps an eye on her. They’ve actually become friends.”

            “Mad Cat’s on what?” Talon spluttered.

            “Probation.” Kayla rolled her eyes. “She’s getting on in her years and decided that she wanted to retire without the law chasing her to every corner of the earth. You shouldn’t know any more than that.” Mad Cat meowed and waved to Talon. There was no characteristic smirk now. Her whiskers drooped and her eyes glistened. If she were a human, Penny would have said the feline were heartbroken. Before Mad Cat could make a move towards Talon, Brain shook his head and hustled her away.

            “I’m sorry I can’t stay and chat,” Kayla said, motioning for the lunch lady to bring the time travelers a pair of chocolate-drowned banana splits. “I’m supposed to be at an exam in fifteen minutes, but I figure you guys can entertain yourselves.” She waved. “I’m sure they’ll be ready to ship you off soon. I’ll come say goodbye.”

            “Well I guess we just have to sit here,” muttered Penny, stabbing her sundae and nibbling half-heartedly at a bite…the taste changed her mind. “Wow! They’ve perfected ice cream in the three years we were gone!”

            “Mmhhm!” Talon muttered through a mouthful of the delectable dessert.

            Although the ice cream was a pleasant distraction for a time, eventually sugar transformed into conversation. It was like the Valentine’s Day debacle all over again. Talon spent nearly five minutes complaining about how often public transportation was late, and Penny couldn’t for the life of her track how they’d arrived at that topic. He then explained, complete with wild hand gestures (and at one point a white board that seemed to materialized out of thin air) a MAD plot to make trains run on time all over the world. It certainly counted as evil, but Penny couldn’t come up with a reason to foil such a plot. Public Transit would be fixed permanently. Talon would never miss another hair appointment because of a late bus, and it would only require stealing some park benches.

            “You’re absolutely crazy,” Penny got out between giggles.

            “Well, duh! Why do you think it’s called MAD?”

            Somehow Penny ended up telling Talon the story of how she’d foiled a variety of other MAD henchmen as well some of Baron von Steeltoe’s hired muscle. “And then they all tripped over each other’s legs and fell of the bridge. That was that.”

            Talon snorted. “And… what? That’s all it took to defeat them? Oh come on! How did Henchman Two win MAD Agent of the month? So not fair!”

            “I destroy MAD Agents all the time,” Penny pointed out, “but you’re the only who’s actually _difficult_ to destroy. I think I might actually get bored if you weren’t around—not that your ego really needed to hear that. Why did I even say that?”

            Rolling his eyes and ignoring her last sentence, Talon answered “And if I only had to fight with Gadget, I’d probably go mad for real, not MAD like the organization, mad like insane, and Uncle Claw probably wouldn’t even pay for me to go to a nice asylum. He’s too cheap.”

            Penny shook her head, scraping her spoon along the empty bowl. “Why do you stay with him?”

            “He’s… he’s family.”

            “So?”

            “Well, why do you stick with Gadget? He’s constantly getting in the way, throwing you off your game, driving you crazy.”  
            “It’s… different.”

            “Oh really. How?”

            “Well… he’s nice. He cares about me. He’d do anything to protect me!”

            “Well, so would my uncle.” She raised an eyebrow. “Seriously.” She raised her second eyebrow. “You don’t know him!”

            “I know the organization he runs.”

            Talon’s eyes narrowed. “You stop it! That’s out of bounds!”

            Penny once thought she had seen him angry before, but this wasn’t that flippant, passing anger or annoyance she saw when she foiled his plots. This was true, righteous fury, the kind that shook her to the bone and made her raise her hands defensively. “Sorry. Sorry. I shouldn’t go there. Let’s forget that, okay?”

            It took several minutes and two mugs of hot chocolate before the pair settled into conversation again. It was considerably more amicable this time.

            Still half-laughing from Talon’s assessment of why unicycles are the worst invention on the planet, Penny told him outright, “You know, it’s kind of too bad we never had a chance to hang out together without, you know, trying to foil each other’s plans. If you weren’t evil I think we’d be friends. It’s too bad you’re a MAD Agent, really.”

            “No, it’s too bad you’re an HQ agent. You could always switch you know…”

            “No, you could always switch.” Talon sighed and shook his head.

            “Hey lovebirds!” called Kayla from the door.

            “We are not lovebirds!” the two shouted together.

            “Yeah, whatever. Penny and the professor sent me to get you. We’ve got the portal reversed. We’re ready to send you home.”

            Penny bit her lip as she realized she’d rather stay another few hours and chat with her… frenemy? But followed Talon and Kayla back to the lab without another word.

            “All ready?” asked Penny as the trio filed into the lab. An interesting silver contraption lay on the table, red and green lights blinking rhythmically as the professor tinkered with a few connections.

            “Yup,” Future Penny said. “Remember that I promised Talon no strings attached. Don’t make me a liar. When you get back, you have to let him go.”

            “Yeah, Penny, you have to let me go!”

            “Fine,” Penny rolled her eyes. “I was going to, anyway. I’m not a liar now and I never will be.”

            Kayla smiled at the two of them. “Goodbye, kids. Have a good flight.”

            “Kids?” asked Talon. “You’re only three years older than me!”

The professor flipped a switch and the contraption began to hum softly, a portal spiraling into existence and beginning to suck things like papers and light tools towards it.

            “Thanks everyone. Bye!” Penny yelled, leaping into the hypnotic tangle of the purple vortex.

            Talon moved to follow her, wondering what kind of dramatic quip he should throw over his shoulder before his departure, but Future Penny grabbed his shoulder. “One moment. I have two things for you. First,” she handed him a pendant, a black raven in flight on a flawless silver chain… quite beautiful and definitely his style. She also slipped a letter into his hand. “This letter will explode if you try to open it before 6:00 pm on the 23rd of June. I really need you to read it, so don’t try to open it before then. And, Talon?”

            “Uh, what?” Her behavior wasn’t _entirely_ out of character. He liked her and he knew she liked him too, even if they were worst enemies for life… but it was definitely mostly out of character.

            Penny kissed him, so lightly and so quickly he wasn’t sure it had really occurred, and then maneuvered him through the portal before he could even begin to process what had just happened. “I’m sorry it has to be this way!” her voice echoed after him.

            Talon, dazed and confused (to use the song title) and Penny, not quite so dazed and confused, found themselves back in the park, Talon clutching a raven pendant and a letter, Penny eyeing the items suspiciously. The sun had long since set and only the gloomy light of a few lamps illuminated the grass.

            “What did you do, Talon?”

            It took the gears grinding in his brain a few seconds to catch up with the thread of conversation. “I didn’t do anything!” he yelled. “Future you grabbed me and handed these to me and then you…”

            “And then I what, Talon?”

            “Never mind, okay? Just, forget about it!” He shot off into the evening air.

            “Talon! What did I say, Talon?” Why would she do that, secretly give things to Talon? Things from the future? There wasn’t any point in fretting about it. She’d understand someday, right? But there were so many things about the whole trip that just didn’t quite add up… she shivered despite herself, foreboding nestling deep in her bones. “Never mind what you did, Talon. What did I do? Or… what will I do?”

***

Talon pushed another stack of paper clips and sticky notes to the side. There _had_ to be stamps somewhere in this junk drawer! There! One forever stamp coming right up. “Hah!” He half wished he hadn’t found any stamps. That would have given him an excuse not to mail this letter, but the raven pendant around his neck was a constant reminder that there was more to their relationship that just smacking and annoying each other, and he thought he’d lose it unless he took some initiative about it… although he’d hoped that Penny would take the initiative and call him or send him a letter or something. Except she didn’t have his private number… same as he didn’t have hers. Well, the letter was stamped, for better or worse. He’d toss it in the post in the morning.

            It was June 23rd. It was… 6:05 on June 23rd. He’d somehow lost track of the passage of time. Future Penny’s letter lay on the dresser, neatly tucked between a copy of _Macbeth_ and _The Lord of the Rings_. What? The evil plots involved were timeless! He’d been so caught up in other things he’d nearly forgotten about the letter, but now couldn’t stand the thought of ignoring it for one more second.

            Talon ripped through the paper, which fortunately did not explode. It wasn’t clear if there had been a detonation device at all. Maybe Future Penny had just lied about it to keep him from opening it early? Ooh. That was evil. There was so much potential there!

 

            _Dear Talon,_

_It will become apparent why I chose to hand you the answer to your letter rather than mail it. Sorry about that, but it has to be this way. Don’t tell me about this note, please. I’m getting a reply ready for you in the past, but due to complications, I wanted to give you this reply directly so I can make sure you get it. I don’t want to torture you too much, so I’ll get right to it—your letter was painfully sappy, and I absolutely do want to be your nemesis. So Dr. Claw’s the “big bad guy,” but you’re the only person who actually gets things done. I’d be happy to make it official that only I kick your butt and only you annoy the heck out of me. Unfortunately, I will be busy next weekend, but I’m sure I would have been happy to meet you for dinner. I remember looking forward to all the ridiculous plots of yours I’d get to foil once you struck out on your own. Let’s face it—Claw’s MAD was never your style and he treated you like dirt. You’re a high-class supervillain; you don’t have to take that from him. Being “evil” means doing what you want no matter what others try to force on you. Being good sometimes means that, too, but it can also mean doing what you have to even when it’s the last thing you would ever want to do. Want to know a secret? I think you’re obsessive and childish about it, but I really do like your hair. Finally, I can’t begin to tell you how sorry I am that it had to be this way. You’ll know what I mean soon enough. You’re the best nemesis I could hope for. MAD never came up with a single good scheme without you, not that your ego needed to hear that. Just, keep it in mind, okay?_

_Goodbye, Talon._

_-Penny_

_P.S. My untraceable private phone is XXX-XXX-XXXX extension XXXX_

 

            He wasn’t blushing. Of course not! Well, fine, he was, but he always blushed when people said nice things about his hair. It was weird to have someone answer a letter he hadn’t even mailed yet… and there was Claw yelling for him to come downstairs and listen to an evil scheme monologue. He glanced back at the letter. He’d rather read it through a second time than go listen to his uncle explain his latest idea for making motorized sentient shopping carts or something. “Talon!” came the roar.

            “I’m on my way, hold your horses!”

            It wasn’t sentient shopping carts. Why couldn’t it just be something ridiculous like that? He could get behind sentient shopping carts. This, though…

            “Don’t you think turning everyone in Metro City into a glass statue is a little extreme, Uncle Claw?”

            “Nonsense. The Barron was just bragging about his new ray to turn entire mountains into popcorn. Popcorn! I can do better than popcorn. Look at the workmanship!” A purple ray struck a nearby chair which promptly turned into an elaborate piece of flowing, glass furniture. “Beautiful, isn’t it? Irreversible. They’ll be stuck as glass statues in my garden forever!”

            “You’re just gonna… kill everyone in Metro City?” That seemed absolutely evil, and not the kind of crazy evil Talon enjoyed, the kind of evil that he avoided like the plague. Claw had been more erratic than usual lately, coming up with steadily more violent schemes, hitting Talon harder when they inevitably failed.

            “This is my last chance to outdo the Baron in the World Wide Evil Contest! Only you and Henchman Two will know about it. There’s no chance of HQ finding out. If you stick to your part, it will go off without a hitch and HQ and Metro City will be destroyed before they even know there’s a threat. Of course, you should watch out for the Baron as well. He seemed mighty angry with you after your last little escapade.” He had seemed pretty mad, and given how uptight Claw was about this contest—maybe he ought to watch his back in case the other villains were losing their marbles too.

            Nothing to worry about. He packed up the equipment carefully, Henchman Two working dutifully beside him. HQ would find out and stop them. HQ always found out and stopped them. To think that he was actually grateful for it this time! Except… if HQ didn’t find out from him or from Henchman Two… crap. HQ wasn’t going to find out at all. The plot would go off without a hitch. They would be turning everyone in Metro City into glass… what was so bad about that? Glass is pretty. Everyone likes statues.

“Oh, who am I kidding? Yeah, I like stealing things and blowing this up and occasionally kidnapping people and annoying the life out of HQ, but I don’t _kill_ people! No way.” His mind drifted back to the letter: “you don’t have to take that from him.” “Evil means doing what you want no matter what other people try to force on you.”

***

            HQ found out, or rather Penny did. An anonymous caller dialed her private number directly and, through a thick accent, informed her that. “My lord! MAD is going to turn everyone in Metro City into glass! They’re setting up a ray on the Dresden Building!”

            Penny didn’t wait for the Chief to pick up, heading for the Dresden Building at a sprint. There wasn’t time to fetch Brain or her uncle, not if the caller were telling the truth, and, as it turned out, the caller _was_ telling the truth. She met Talon and a MAD henchman as she smashed open the door to the roof. “Penny!” Talon growled. “And where’s Gadget?”

            She glared at him, furious that he’d dare try something like this. Since when did he murder people? By the thousands? She’d just started thinking better of him! “I thought this couldn’t wait!” Making a flying leap across the building she tackled him to the ground. To anyone unfamiliar with him it seemed like a real fight, but Penny knew Talon like the back of her hand. It wasn’t a real fight, not even close, though Talon put on a decent show before “carelessly” throwing her into the huge, black machine perched like a carrion bird which pointed a menacing ray down at the streets of Metro City. He’d seamlessly choreographed his own defeat. She took a handful of conveniently unsecured wires and ripped them out.

            “No!” Talon fake-screamed. Just as the other MAD henchman approached, muscles bulging menacingly through his suit, a cry of “Wowzers!” announced the timely arrival of Inspector Gadget.

            By the time the Gadget-induced fire died down and the smoke cleared, both MAD henchman had disappeared and Chief Quimby was congratulating Gadget on his most critical success to date. The chief must have noticed Penny’s pensive look, though, because he glanced at her worriedly. “What’s wrong Penny?”

            “He threw the fight,” she muttered, then a grin slowly spread across her face. “He threw the fight! Yes! Talon may be bad but I knew he wouldn’t do something like this!” She pumped her fist in the air.

***

It was three days after the glass ray incident that Penny dragged herself home, exhausted, at 8pm, to discover there was a letter waiting for her. Who used snail mail anymore anyways? It smelled vaguely of hair gel. Talon? Well, he had been acting a bit off. Even so… she should open it outside in case it exploded… maybe that was overkill? It was too late and she was too tired to walk down to the park just to open a letter. It turned out to be a good thing she had elected to read it in the privacy of her room:

            _Dear Penny,_

_This sounds stupid. I can’t believe I’m even writing this let alone—yeah. So, you know how we’ve been fighting for a really long time now? Practically every day? So, it occurred to me how much I’d miss you bothering the heck out of me if you weren’t there. I mean, sure, Gadget’s annoying. The other agents are annoying, but they’re all so lame compared to you. You once said “no one beats up Talon except me” or something like that and I really feel the same about you. If we were on the same side I’d maybe ask you out or something. I can’t believe I just wrote that. Ugh. Sappy. But its moot ‘cause I’m bad. So, I know Dr. Claw’s the big bad guy and all, but he’s got Gadget as a nemesis (even though we both know you’re the one who actually does the work in defeating his plans)—and I’m getting off track again. Okay. Would you be my nemesis, Penny? Is it weird to ask? It seems weird but I really have to know. So. Anyways… Future You said it was alright to hang out sometimes when we’re not punching each other and no one would think anything of it, so if you’re not totally furious with me right now, would you like to, I don’t know, get dinner and talk about it? This weekend maybe? Oh god, I am asking you out, but not like that! I despise you. I despise you so much I want to talk with you about making it exclusive. Well, now I feel totally weird… so…. Let me know?_

_-Talon_

_P.S. Here’s my private number: XXX-XXX-XXXX extension XXXX_

 

            She was most certainly not blushing. She was much too professional for that. Why would she blush anyway? It wasn’t like she felt the same way… good. Keep telling herself that.

            She found herself picking up her phone despite herself. Old school letters might make sense for Talon, who had clearly been unspeakably nervous about talking to her, but she was not nervous. She could call him on the actual telephone and give her answer. How did Talon have her address, she wondered? Well, whatever. Her home’s location wasn’t a very well-kept secret.

            The answering machine chirped at her, Talon’s familiar voice letting her know “Hey. This is Talon and I can’t talk right now in case you didn’t figure that out yet. Either leave a message after the beep or give up and get a life!” followed by his signature annoying laugh.

            “So. Hi. I, uh, got your letter… you dork! What was that? Something out of _Pride and Prejudice_? So. Yeah. Sappy as syrup. Unprocessed syrup. So sap. Yes. Sappy as sap. Okay, enough of that. Anyway, yes. I’d love—I mean, there’s this nice pasta place I know. Nice and quiet. So… Friday night, maybe? We can, you know, talk about the whole nemesis thing, maybe just hang out a while without anyone getting punched. You can tell me more of your plots to make public transit run on time because that was hilarious—I mean scandalous! So. Yeah. Call me. I can’t believe I just left this message what is wrong with m-” click.

            Penny tossed her phone on the bed and wondered where that one-sided conversation started to go wrong. Probably when she said “Hi.” She should have written a letter, too. Talon’s was in pencil and covered with smudges that informed her he’d changed his mind about phrasing repeatedly. She wished she could erase large portions of that message, but it was done.

***

The Chief woke her early. The message had been an oddity. Penny and her uncle had been asked to come to a crime scene by the local police force. She had never been to a crime scene like this. Certainly, there were plenty of crime scene visits involved in hunting MAD, but those were usually something out of a Road Runner cartoon, complete with a Talon-shaped hole in the wall. There were never any flashing red and blue lights, no emergency vehicles crowding the alley, engines idling for no apparent reason, officers in painfully blue uniforms taking notes and pictures. A long, keening whoop announced the arrival of yet another police car. How many could they possibly need?

            Penny ducked under the yellow tape, flashing the ID on her Codex. Her uncle and a mustached officer by the name of Hammond informed Brain that “This is no place for dogs… except police dogs anyway,” and he reluctantly stayed behind, whimpering softly in his throat.

            “Penny?” asked a small woman, black hair pulled back into a neat ponytail, eyes narrowed into slits that said as clearly as any words, ‘There will be no nonsense at my crime scene. And don’t you ever doubt it’s my crime scene.’ At Penny’s nod, the woman replied, “I’m Captain Lesley Grace.”

            Shaking hands, the young HQ agent said, “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Captain Grace.” She winced at the sound of Gadget breaking something in the background. “If you don’t mind me asking, this is all rather unusual. Why did you request we come?”

            “It’s an unusual situation.” The Captain led her towards a pile of skunk-rotten garbage bags lying in a heap near the back of the alley. “I thought it best to get in contact with your Chief.” She paused a moment. “God you look so young…” she shook her head. “I’m sorry, it just feels so wrong involving you in this. You always look older on the news.” That was enough to make anyone nervous, but Penny wasn’t nervous, HQ agents didn’t get nervous, unless it was prudent to be nervous, and it really sounded like it would be prudent to be nervous. It sounded more prudent after the next words. “You should prepare yourself for a bit of a shock…”

            What could it possibly be? What could be so bad as to make this woman nervous about even _showing_ her? Captain Grace motioned to a younger officer and the man pulled the sheet away from the garbage heap.

            The world stopped moving. A wasp in front of her stood frozen in place, wings mid-beat. Papers blowing in the breeze halted. Police sirens paused mid whoop. Why was it sunny? A cloudless sky didn’t fit. It should be pouring… or at least cloudy. She should stop staring now. She wished she could stop staring.

            “Penny?” asked Grace. “Hey. Look at me.” Penny snapped around to stare unblinking into the captain’s eyes. “I need to know if this is a trick. You’re my best chance for that. I’m sorry, but please…”

            “Wowzers!” Penny stumbled forward as her uncle slammed into her back, a victim of yet another Go-Go-Gadget Roller Skate Malfunction (patent pending). “Now what’s all this about-” He stopped mid-sentence. It appeared there were things even he couldn’t misunderstand.

            Be pragmatic. She sank to her knees, ran through a checklist buried somewhere in her subconscious. She took her time. Be careful. Try to convince yourself it’s a cruel trick, that’s right. It had to be a trick… It wasn’t a trick. Some things couldn’t be faked.

            “Yes,” Penny said at last, shocked by how cold and dispassionate her voice sounded. “I mean no. No. No trick. That’s Talon. He never could sneak his disguises past me…”

            She whirled away, walking on like a mechanical doll, ducking gracelessly beneath the yellow tape.  Brain whimpered at her, but she kept walking. It wasn’t that she wanted to ignore him, it was that she simply couldn’t stop walking, couldn’t stop or else the image would catch up with her, that image already burned into her brain forever of Talon lying in a garbage heap with two holes in his chest, blood caked around his mouth and eyes glassy like a lake in the fog, fingers loosely wrapped around the pendant at his throat.

            He was unspeakably annoying. He was always getting in the way, causing chaos, stealing things, going where he didn’t belong, making ridiculous claims he couldn’t back up, obsessing about his hair gel, which she had smelled even above the stench of the garbage and the blood. Absolutely detestable in every single aspect. Why, she’d fantasized about bashing his skull in herself!

            That last thought ended with her smashing her fist into the nearest solid object- which turned out to be a tree- and hoping she’d broken enough fingers to pay for even thinking such a thing as part of a flimsy rationalization.

            By that point Brain and Gadget had caught up with her, though neither had found anything to say. Eventually she said something herself. “Why is Talon dead?” It was so stupid she felt it necessary to punch the poor tree again, hopefully breaking some fingers in her other hand. Oh, she was not handling this well. The training room would give her zero points for sure.

            “I-” for once in his life, Gadget seemed to come to the conclusion that he really didn’t understand what was going on. “We should go home, Penny.” Brain barked his agreement.

            She didn’t have the heart to fight either of them, so she let them drag her back to the waiting car. Her aching fingers clenched into fists as she clipped her seatbelt. They’d placed the time of death at about 6pm the day before. So he never got her message. Somehow that seemed to be the worst part. “Someone,” she growled through gritted teeth, “Someone is going to pay!”

***

            Kayla had brought enough tea and tissues to handle almost anything. However, getting Penny to sit down and drink any of said tea or partake in any of said tissues proved to be nearly impossible. “What am I even supposed to feel?” Penny yelled, running her fingers through his hair. “He’s my worst enemy!”

            Kayla waited until the outburst was over, nudging the teacup (it’s label read “World’s Greatest Iron Cage Gladiator”) towards a pacing Penny as Brain shrugged helplessly. “He was, and I know you may not want to hear this right now, or in fact ever,” Kayla began carefully, “also one of your closest friends.”

            “We were not friends!” Penny shouted, then slowly sank down onto the couch, letting her head fall on the table. “What is this? The five stages of grief at superspeed? It seems like I’ve gone through them all. Here we are at depression.”

            “Well,” Kayla half smiled, “You never do anything slowly.”

            “I have to find who did this,” Penny murmured.

            “Yeah,” Kayla agreed. “But first you need to have some tea and probably cry for a few hours straight.”

            “I’m not going to cry.” Brain made an incredulous noise. “HQ agents don’t cry.”

            “Don’t be silly,” Kayla told her firmly. “HQ agents cry when it’s called for. I didn’t know Talon nearly as well as you did, but I certainly found him annoying, and even so I certainly feel like crying. I mean… MAD does crazy things all the time, it’s in their name, but no one’s ever _died_ before. No good guys, no bad guys… or at least no one we knew… It’s like being hit in the face with a big sign that says: ‘Welcome to the Real World, Population You’ and you realize the Real World sucks but there’s nothing you can do about it.”

            “Thanks Kayla,” Penny half-chuckled.

***

            Penny kicked the grate out of the ceiling and dropped down onto the verdant carpet, glowering at the security cameras. She’d looped them. No one would see her coming, not that she cared if someone found out she was coming.

            Some careless henchman fired a ray weapon at her. So someone had found out she was coming. She reflected the ray back with a flick of her wrist guard and the young man flew five feet into a wall with a satisfying “whump.” The security door ahead, made to withstand a nuclear blast, didn’t stand up to her hacking skills. The bars slid aside and Penny stepped into Baron von Steeltoe’s safe room, swaggering as if she owned the place, and soon enough she would. She’d send Steeltoe to the bottom of the most hellish prison she could dig up, or maybe she’d just throw him out that big picture window (no longer covered by a protective metal shield) and watch him fall onto all those thorn bushed two hundred feet below. That sounded more satisfying.

            The Baron was prepared, a smoke bomb and a ray weapon in hand. The room turned into a red blur of righteous fury and by the time the haze cleared, the smoke bomb had been detonated to no avail, the gun was in a hundred pieces, and Baron von Steeltoe was lying on his back on the floor… or rather half on his back on the floor, half out the window. Penny stared down at him, that defenestration idea seeming very appealing now. It had been obvious once she thought about it. Of course he was the one responsible. The Baron and Claw were always feuding.

            “What’s-” coughed the Baron. “What’s this about?”

            “You know what this is about,” Penny kicked him in the knee. How dare he act like he didn’t know? Why she oughta-

            “What?”

            “Talon! That’s what it’s about!”

            The Baron stared at her, perplexed. “He’s not here. I haven’ seen Talon in weeks, not since the party-”

            She kicked him again, harder. “Of course he’s not here! How dare you!” The look upon his face, fake of course, showed no comprehension of any kind, utterly devoid of cohesive thought. Perhaps he was paralyzed with terror. He ought to be. She leaned in to hiss in his ear. “He’s dead. You killed him.”

            “What? I what? No! No!” He cried, a look of extremely convincing surprise and horror upon his face. If this was fake, the Baron deserved an Oscar. “I don’ kill people! When ‘ave I ever killed anyone? Never! I try not to hurt any’un much. It brings too much law enforcement down on ya’… and it always leaves an awful taste in my mouth. And Talon? He was… not a friend, well… maybe... I would never! Never! Believe me. I never would!”

            She did believe him, all that coiled fury in her gut deflating like a popped balloon and leaving a rotten, miserable sickness behind, not just for what she had failed to do- find Talon’s murderer- but for what she had almost done herself- kill someone. She pulled the Baron back into the room and radioed HQ for a pickup.

            “He’s really dead?” asked the Baron so softly Penny almost didn’t hear him.

            “Yes.” Her voice had taken on that emptiness again.

            “How?” he asked.

            “Shot. Twice.”

            The Baron seemed to consider this. “I think… ya’ need to check in on Dr. Claw.”

            “I doubt he really cares. He never cared about Talon one way or the other.”

            “Tha’s not what I meant… rumor has it he was planning something big. Really big. Bad, too. Not my kind of bad.” Not knowing what to say to that, Penny stayed quietly with her charge until the helicopters arrived.

***

Infiltrating MAD headquarters wasn’t that much trouble anymore. No one useful was there to find her and stop her. She liked it that way, of course. She wanted it to be easy. Who was she kidding? She’d give anything for someone to show up and stop her, but no one did, and she weaved through a maze of toxic waste barrels, cobwebs, and abandoned lasers without incident. It certainly helped that Uncle Gadget, Brain, Kayla, and a half dozen other HQ agents were fighting with the main army of henchmen outside, directing all the attention away from her. Chief Quimby hadn’t wanted to send her out again, but she’d made it quite clear that she was going whether she had permission or not, so he had relented. It had been a good decision.

            She cleared the second round of security, automated defenses mostly, without any more trouble. One henchman who ran into her found himself tied up in a supply closet before he knew what had happened. Thank god for convenient supply closets.

            Nothing could surprise her—except Mad Cat jumping down from the ceiling with a squeal that sounded less aggressive and more terrified. The feline threw herself at Penny’s feet, ears back and eyes wide, mewling like a pitiful kitten… and that didn’t fit with her personality at all. Trick? Could be. “Get away from me before I shut you in a supply closet, too!” the young agent hissed. “I’m not in the mood!”

            The cat shook her head, caught sight of something out of the corner of her eye, and leapt behind Penny as if the HQ agent were some kind of living shield. Penny’s eyes snapped to the source of the disturbance and found what had so terrified Mad Cat was… Dr. Claw?

            “It’s really too bad,” the villain boomed, stepping towards her. “That you came along when you did. I’d have ignored you if you came an hour later.”

            “What are you talking about?” Penny drew herself up to her full height, trying not to show any of the fear that coiled about her like a python, cool scales pressing against her arms.

            “In another hour my preparations would be complete and there would be no need to kill you. Oh well.” It always seemed that, given his propensity for staying home, Dr. Claw would be a slow, weak fighter. This was not the case.

            Mad Cat fled with a yowl as Penny ducked under a blow which would have leveled her had it connected. She dodged another strike and threw herself through the nearest door, not much caring where it led as she slammed it behind her. It took Claw all of two seconds to turn it to wood chips, but a two second head start was still something. By the time the villain entered the room, which turned out to be a storage facility for fuel cells, Penny had already leapt onto an overhanging cat walk and fled across the room. She’d thought she could take him… but god he was fast.

            Claw stepped through the remains of the door. “In another hour I would have annihilated Los Angeles and the government would be begging me to accept their surrender.” The mad man chuckled. “You would have been ordered to stand down and we could have been spared all this unpleasantness. Always getting in the way, even after the source of the leaks was silenced.”

            “Source of the leaks?” Penny muttered. Then it clicked. Mad Cat’s terror. The anonymous phone call with the vaguely familiar voice at the end. Her future self giving gifts as if to a friend… or a hero. She couldn’t have guessed exactly what happened, of course.

***

“Those are certainly impressive blue prints! What does it do?” Talon wasn’t accustomed to Dr. Claw showing any enthusiasm when Talon arrived, but he wasn’t accustomed to his uncle slamming laptops closed when he entered rooms, either.

            Mad Cat yawned and smirked at him as if she understood something he didn’t, but Talon knew her well enough to read the underlying confusion beneath the gesture, confusion and maybe even concern. Dr. Claw had been unusually erratic of late. “It’s none of your concern, Talon,” the evil genius clenched a fist. “It’s a secret.”

            “Come on. I’m great with lasers. That was a laser, right?”

            “Yes.”

            “Looked pretty high powered. What’s it for? Are you going to deface some more monuments? I mean, that competition was kind of ridiculous but it was certainly fun.” 

            “And there you failed me, too,” Claw snarled at him, cold fury boiling under his words. Talon inched backwards. “Were you working with the Baron then, too?”

            “What? No! What are you talking about? So he invited me to a party once. That doesn’t mean we’re friends or anything.”

            “Perhaps. Perhaps not. I ought to have silenced the source of these leaks long ago. I would have finished many more plans. I’d probably be ruling the world by now.”

            “Is this about the glass ray? I told you Henchman Two wasn’t really the sort for that-”

            “I wasn’t talking about him.” Claw reached into his pocket. “I meant you.” Oh hell, Claw had guessed that Talon tipped of HQ. He was really going to get it now. He braced himself for his Uncle to hit some button that would drop him into the shark tank again, or loop a rope around his foot to hang him from the ceiling…but that’s not what happened.

            How slowly can time move? How many thoughts can you have in the time it takes someone to pull a trigger twice?

His uncle shot him.

There wasn’t enough time to come to terms with that. There wasn’t enough time in the universe to come to terms with that. Given how his chest burned like the fires of hell had taken up residence there, he certainly couldn’t have spoken even if he had thought of something to say. He dropped to the floor, gasping for air that he couldn’t seem to pull into his lungs.

            In the distance (five feet away, really, but it seemed very distant) Mad Cat was _screaming_ like a banshee, gasping for breaths between howls. Huh. She actually cared after all… well, if Uncle Claw had shot Mad Cat, he’d have screamed, too: from shock, from fear, from sorrow. There wasn’t time to connect all the dots and see the picture, or, thankfully, feel much of anything but disbelief, but there was enough time to sketch in a vaguest impression of what had happened. The letter and the pendant from the future, those were Penny’s goodbye to him. She had known of course. The abandoned base in the future: MAD didn’t exist anymore. “ _MAD never came up with a single good scheme without you._ ”

            Claw loomed over him, his image obscured by grey and black dots, his voice too vague to be understood above Mad Cat’s hysterical screaming. Everything ends before it even begins, and her final words to him, words she’d had years to think of, echoed through a fevered nightmare, cutting through the expanse, one last hurrah before the rest is silence: “I’m sorry it has to be this way!”

***

A dozen gory fantasies flashed before Penny’s eyes. “It was you. You killed him. You killed Talon!” She couldn’t quite believe it even as she said it. How could _family_ do this? How could he have casually shot someone who had saved him from an iceberg, worked tirelessly for him day after day, proven himself again and again to be the only one in MAD with half a brain? The thought made the world tilt unpleasantly. Please let him scream at her and deny it. Please let him say it wasn’t true, even if that meant she never found the real killer.

            “You are sharp,” Claw chuckled. “This was too important to have HQ meddling in our business, and as it turned out Talon seemed to be a bit squeamish about blood.” He just shrugged, as if that were all there was to say.

The Codex had plenty of uses, like slashing through chains holding things to ceilings. Claw actually shouted in surprise as the HQ agent dumped the entire cat walk and several tons of metal containers on his head.

            Pain can be rated on a scale of one to ten. Anger cannot. At some point, words and numbers cease to have meaning when you stand in the center of a tornado. Similarly, there were no words or numbers that could have described the fury with which Penny pummeled the now-roaring Claw with every underhanded trick she could think of and a few that never occurred to conscious thought.

            Something whirred past her ear and the HQ agent realized with a start that the villain now held in his hand a heavy silver hand gun… and she knew that it was the gun that had killed Talon as surely as she knew it would _not_ be the gun that killed her. She leapt to the nearest door and ran, whirling down a hallway, listening to the heavy crashes of boots behind her as Claw pursued. She smirked and turned on a dime, leaping around a blind corner and sailing through something which had once been a wall. She’d kept up with the HQ agent’s chatter. She’d heard Kayla report in when Uncle Gadget had obliterated a significant chunk of the building. Claw, however, had not. She might not be surprised or upset really to find herself plunging towards a mess of tapering rock spires, but he was. She smiled, gloating as he cursed her. It wasn’t so bad to fall onto those rock spires knowing who fell with her…

            Before the thought finished, Gadget snatched her out of the air. “You ought to be more careful around windows, Penny.” She didn’t listen to him, staring down at the spires, wondering vaguely about how she would feel once the haze of rage dissipated, how she could possibly live knowing that she had sent someone to his death, even someone like Claw, Claw who murdered his nephew, murdered her… friend… all over some stupid plot to terrorize America, a task that he could just have easily completed without hurting anyone if he’d set his mind to it, a scheme that he could just as easily have abandoned to become a gardener or a circus contortionist or something moderately evil like a telemarketer or human resources director. She’d hate herself, certainly, but for the moment she would watch the waves wash away the blood and feel nothing at all.

***

After it became obvious how unstable the hideout was, HQ simply slapped heavy barbed wire fences around the place, declared it “Condemned” and left it to rot. Some specialists would come by to stabilize the structure enough for the hazardous material teams to sweep the place, but other than that it would be left alone. Penny wasn’t allowed to participate. The chief was wise not to let her after everything that happened, but she still seethed. She found herself sprawled on the carpet in her room acting out a scene she’d seen once on a soap opera.

            “Hey. This is Talon and I can’t talk right now in case you didn’t figure that out yet. Either leave a message after the beep or give up and get a life!” She’d called about fifty times just to hear him laugh at her. Forever is a very long time to miss someone’s laugh. She would start missing it tomorrow, but for now she’d pretend that one of these times Talon would pick up.

            Mad Cat nosed the door open and padded in. The feline would likely live with them until she died. “No need to knock,” Penny’s voice grated even on her own ears. Ugh. The cat seemed smaller now, drooping towards the floor like a limp rag, pitiful in her misery. “Want to listen to Talon’s voice mail with me?” The feline padded into the room and curled up next to Penny’s leg. What did Mad Cat have to lose now, anyway? One’s reputation probably didn’t seem important when there was nobody left who would care about it.

            “Hey. This is Talon…” With the letter, the revelations it brought, the realization that she had found herself on the verge of that special kind of relationship that most people never even witness, let alone experience, it had felt like a new beginning, the dawn of a new world, but it had all been an illusion, nothing but a masquerading sunset which now gave way to a starless night. It seemed she could see them all—all the shadows of her past life bleeding away into the waves of black, the last reaches of the light fading away into silent anonymity.

            “Hey. This is Talon in case you didn’t figure that out yet. Either leave a message after the beep or give up and get a life!”

***

“You could have warned them about what’s going to happen,” Kayla murmured. They’d had this conversation before.

            Penny watched the portal close on the retreating figures of the time travelers. “The professor and I have done the math. Hundreds of times. If I’d warned either of them, there’s a good chance that Claw would have gotten away with destroying Los Angeles, or doing something similar. To save millions of lives, Claw had to die, and for Claw to die Talon had to die, and yes, I feel like an absolute monster saying that.”

            Kayla sighed. “Trading lives…”

            “Is the one thing we never do,” Penny finished. “I rationalize it by telling myself that they, meaning Talon and I, weren’t supposed to be here in the first place and messing with the past is also something we never do.” It wasn’t rationalizing much for her, really. Words were too hollow to fill the hole in her chest.

            Mad Cat, slinking close to the floor, followed Brain into the room. The pair had watched from the doorway. The feline stared at the lot of them, accusation heavy in her gaze. ‘You have sent your friend to die,’ she said wordlessly, but her gaze softened into sympathy when she caught sight of the tears. Anger was a fickle emotion, for Penny as well as Mad Cat—the two who had known Talon well, and had similarly complicated relationships with him.

            “I had to rehearse what to say to them,” Penny muttered. “And I still almost couldn’t go through with it.”

            The professor sighed deeply, rubbing his nose. “You know it had to be this way.” Maybe. Maybe they could have saved everyone, but somewhere along the line they’d made the call and decided they couldn’t take the chance.

            “Yeah.” Penny flicked the lights off as she left the room, leaving the others, who would depart for home soon enough, to stand in the dark. “Yeah, I know.”

 

 

 

 


End file.
